Five things to know about Juvenile Life Insurance

Juvenile life insurance, or life insurance on your kids, is scary to talk about. It’s almost taboo, and I get that. I mean, no one wants to feel like they’re going to profit off their child’s death. Also, the idea of your kid dying is jarring to your core, it goes against everything that feels right and good — heck, it goes against lifecycles itself.

We’ve put together a quick 5 point article on life insurance for kids, and we hope you’ll get something from it.

1. It’s not profiting off the death of your child

This is a super common emotion, and the biggest reason, other than talking about the possibility of your child dying, that people don’t bring it up with their spouses.

I say this, though: if you wouldn’t give up every penny of that life insurance policy to bring your child back, it’s not profit.

2. It can protect them in the future

Juvenile life insurance isn’t just for when they’re a baby or toddler. It can give them guaranteed insurability for their life.

“Hey, Eddie, what is ‘guaranteed insurability’?”

So glad you asked. Guaranteed insurability means they will always be able to be insured, at least in a small way. You see, getting a policy when they’re young gives them a baseline level of protection in case they get diagnosed with something that would otherwise exclude them. That could be diabetes, autism, cancer, MS, leukemia or myriad other diseases.

If they get a policy at a month old and diagnosed with autism at 3 months, they have that policy still. If they get insurance at a year and are diagnosed with breast cancer at 17, they still have that insurance.

3. It can be more than temporary

There are whole life, universal life, and term life policies available. Whole and universal will last for their entire life, term will usually expire somewhere between 18-22.

What’s great, though, is term is usually convertible. What that means is that temporary policy can be turned into a permanent policy, whole or universal, at certain points. That conversion usually doesn’t require underwriting, as well.

That means your child’s term policy can usually be turned into a permanent policy even if they were diagnosed with a life-altering disease.

4. It can fund the future

Many people are aware of 529 College Savings Plans.

Fewer people are aware that a well structures whole or indexed universal life policy can sometimes be more advantageous. This is a wholly different article, so we’ll touch on only a couple things here

First, the value of a 529 plan has to be reported on FAFSA, which may alter financial assistance options.

Secondly, you can help fund college and provide life insurance protection, including guaranteed insurability, in one product.

5. Life insurance isn’t just for breadwinners

Just because someone isn’t bringing in income to your family doesn’t mean there would not be a financial impact should they die, and that financial impact goes beyond burial costs.

Think of the time off one would need to grieve. I have a friend who lost her four year old child a number of years ago. She was able to take only two days off work, and never had the time to properly mourn. That’s inhumane.

Five years ago we would see car washes to raise the funds to bury children. Now we see GoFundMe accounts for the same. No one should have to beg to bury their child. Juvenile life insurance can often be had for mere dollars each month.

Wrapping up

Juvenile life insurance is a necessity. It’s affordable. It bring multi-faceted protection to those we promise to care for. We hope this quick article cleared up some myths and brought some clarity to this fantastic tool for your family.

If you have any questions or want a consultation on your options, just reach out to us below.